Noah kept texting me.
NOAH: Dad says the bank messed up and blessed us.
NOAH: Madison bought shoes online.
NOAH: Mom isn’t saying much. She looks scared.
I read each message slowly.
Daniel saw opportunity.
Madison saw spending.
My mother saw avoidance.
And Noah saw everything.
I texted back once.
Stay upstairs when the phone rings.
Then I turned my phone off.
What came next didn’t belong on a screen.
Through the front window I could see the party gathering momentum. The new eighty-five-inch television dominated the living room like a monument to bad decisions. Daniel stood in front of it with whiskey in hand, grinning like a man being rewarded by the universe.
“To the system finally doing us a favor,” he announced.
A few of his friends laughed. Madison stood near the couch taking pictures, angling her new shoes into the frame.
“This is insane,” she said. “I’m posting this. We are literally blessed.”
Daniel raised his glass. “That’s right. Blessed.”
Then the landline rang.
It sliced through the room.
No one moved at first.
Then it rang again.
And again.
Daniel rolled his eyes. “Fine. I got it.”
He picked up the phone and hit speaker.
“Yeah?”